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Privacy Policy

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TRUSTe

Effective: October 4, 2023

Copyright Clearance Center (“CCC,” “we,” or “us”) cares about your privacy and wants you to be familiar with how it handles your personal information. This Privacy Policy describes how we use and disclose the personal information we collect on www.copyright.com, a CCC owned and operated website, and any other website where this Privacy Policy is posted or linked (collectively, this “Website”), as well as the personal information we may collect or otherwise obtain in connection with the operation of our business. It also describes the choices and rights available to you in relation to your personal information and how you can exercise your choices and rights.

COLLECTION OF PERSONAL INFORMATION

We may collect or obtain information relating to you in a variety of ways. Such information may include personal information (i.e., information that identifies, relates to, describes, is capable of being associated with, or could reasonably be linked, directly or indirectly, with a particular individual). Additional details about our collection of personal information can be found below.

Personal information you provide

You may access and read most material on this Website without giving us any information that identifies you. However, when you engage in certain activities on this Website, we may ask you to provide certain information about yourself and/or your organization by submitting a completed web form. These activities include accessing educational sessions, whitepapers, and other high-value content or seeking and receiving permissions, authorizations, or licenses to use the copyrighted works of the copyright rightsholders we represent. These activities also include requesting to speak with one of our experts. It is completely optional for you to fill out these forms and/or engage in these activities.

The information that we request and collect enables us to provide you with the permission, authorization, license, or other information you are seeking. Should you choose not to provide the requested information, however, it may not be possible for CCC to provide those services or information to you.

Should you choose to take advantage of our services or seek to speak with one of our experts, we may require that you provide us with certain information, such as your name, organization name, mailing address, email address, phone number, username, and password. Should you choose to pay for our services with a credit card, you may be asked to provide a card number, expiration date, and the name and address of the cardholder. If you add an additional user to your account, we will ask for the additional user’s name, phone number, and email address.

Please note that, in some cases, you may access CCC’s services through the website of a participating copyright rightsholder, such as a publisher or one of our integration partners (e.g., a course management system provider). In those cases, you will be directed to a webpage within this Website, and it is CCC that will be collecting your information, even though you may continue to see the copyright rightsholder’s branding or logo. CCC will share your information with the copyright rightsholder as described in the “Disclosure of Personal Information” section of this Privacy Policy.

Some of our pages utilize framing techniques to serve content to/from our partners while preserving the look and feel of this Website. Please be aware that you are providing your personal information to these third parties and not to CCC.

Referrals: If you choose to use our referral service to tell a friend about this Website, we will ask you for your friend’s name and email address. We will automatically send your friend a one-time email inviting them to visit this Website. We will store this information for the sole purpose of sending this one-time email. Your friend may contact us at info@copyright.com to request that we remove their information from our database.

Single Sign-on: You can log in to this Website using sign-in services using your corporate username. These services will authenticate your identity and provide you the option to share certain personal information (such as your name and email address) with us and to pre-populate our sign-up form.

Personal information collected by automated means

Like most websites, when you visit and interact with this Website, we collect certain information automatically about your browser, device, and/or activity and store such information in log files. This information may include your device’s Internet Protocol (“IP”) address(es), browser type, browser settings, language settings, date(s) and time(s) of your visit(s) to this Website, and the webpage you visited immediately prior to this Website.

We collect this information through various means, including through cookies and/or other similar technologies (e.g., web beacons). We do not link this information to other information we collect from or about you.  Please see the “Cookies and Other Similar Technologies” section below for further information.

Personal information received from other sources

We may supplement the information you provide with commercially-available demographic and address information in order to enhance our ability to serve you.

We generally do not seek personal information that may be considered “sensitive” (e.g., government-issued identification numbers and information related to an individual’s racial or ethnic origin, political opinions, religious or other similar beliefs, health conditions, criminal background, or sex life/sexual orientation), and we ask that users of this Website not provide such information on or through this Website.

USE OF PERSONAL INFORMATION

We use your personal information for the purpose(s) for which it was collected or provided to us. The specific business purposes for which we may use the personal information we collect or otherwise obtain about you are described below.

  • Provide and manage this Website and our services. We use your personal information in connection with the provision, administration, and management of this Website and our services. For example, we use the personal information that you provide us to record and support your licensing and other activities.
  • Communicate with and market to you. We use your personal information to respond to your inquires and fulfill your requests, reach out to you about your account (where applicable), or request information or feedback. From time to time, we may use your personal information to send important updates about this Website or our services and communications about changes to this Privacy Policy and/or other applicable terms, conditions, and policies. Additionally, we may use your personal information to send you marketing and promotional communications and materials (additional details can be found below).
  • Customize and personalize this Website. We use your personal information to help us understand which parts of this Website are of most interest to you and customize or personalize your user experience.
  • Identify usage trends and improve this Website. We use your personal information to help us (or our partners and service providers) conduct research and analytics about your use of this Website and identify usage trends. We also use your personal information to identify issues with and improve this Website.
  • Fraud prevention and security monitoring. We use your personal information to detect, prevent, and investigate fraud and for other security purposes.
  • Comply with law. We may use your personal information to comply with applicable law and/or respond to requests and communications from law enforcement authorities or other government officials.
  • As otherwise necessary or appropriate. We may use your personal information as we believe necessary or appropriate to protect our rights, privacy, safety, or property, and/or those of you or others.

Marketing and promotional communications: CCC regularly distributes communications via email and direct mail regarding upcoming webinars and other events, news about our products and services, and informative content on related topics, subject to obtaining your consent in accordance with applicable law. If you wish to receive this type of information in the future, please complete the form found here. Also, please note that if you have identified yourself or are identified by your employer as being associated with a CCC-participating organization, we may use your personal information to send you promotional communications from CCC (such communications may be sent either directly from us or through your participating organization). Instructions on how to opt out of receiving marketing-related communications from us are included in the “Your Choices and Rights” section below.

Legal basis for processing personal information: Applicable law in your country of residence may require us to set out the legal basis upon which we rely in order to use, retain, and disclose your personal information. Generally, we will use, retain, and/or disclose your personal information in the following circumstances:

  • we need to perform the contract we have entered into with you or are about to enter into with you;
  • you have consented to such use, retention, and/or disclosure;
  • we have a legitimate interest in using, retaining, and/or disclosing your personal information (e.g., for network and information systems security; data analytics; enhancing, modifying, or improving our services; identifying usage trends, etc.), provided that our interests are not overridden by your interests or fundamental rights and freedoms; or
  • we need to comply with a legal or regulatory obligation to which we are subject.

Additionally, to the extent that we collect and use, retain, or disclose any sensitive personal information relating to you, we will do so because either: (i) you have given us explicit consent to collect and use, retain, or disclose the information; (ii) our collection and use, retention, or disclosure of the information is necessary for the establishment, exercise, or defense of legal claims; or (iii) you have made the information manifestly public.

If you have any questions or concerns about the legal basis upon which we collect and handle any of your personal information, you can contact us using the details in the “Contact Us” section below.

COOKIES AND OTHER SIMILAR TECHNOLOGIES

“Cookies” are small text files that are place on your computer or device when you visit certain websites. We and our partners, affiliates, or service providers use cookies and other similar technologies (e.g., web beacons, pixel tags, etc.) for various purposes, including to record information about your device, your browser, and, in some cases, your preferences and browsing habits. For example, we may use cookies to distinguish between users and remember your language preferences. Additionally, we may use cookies to administer this Website, track users’ movements around this Website, analyze trends, and gather demographic information about our user base as a whole.

We may receive statistical reports from our partners and service providers based on the information collected through the use of these technologies. These reports may tell us, for example, how many users visited this Website or which pages have been browsed, on an individual, anonymized basis as well as aggregated basis.

Most browsers are set to automatically accept cookies. However, you can control the use of cookies on this Website through your web browser. If you reject or disable cookies, you may still use this Website, but your ability to use some features or areas of this Website may be limited. To learn more about cookies, please visit https://allaboutcookies.org/.

“Do Not Track” Signals: “Do Not Track” (or “DNT”) is a preference that you can set in certain web browsers to inform the websites you visit that you do not want information about your online activity collected over time and across third-party websites or online services. We do not honor DNT or other similar signals at this time, due to the lack of a clear industry standard.

Google Analytics: We use Google Analytics, a web analytics tool that may set cookies in your web browser, in order to help us understand how users engage with this Website. To learn more about Google Analytics’ data practices, please visit https://support.google.com/analytics/topic/2919631?hl=en&ref_topic=1008008. For opt-out options specific to Google Analytics, please visit https://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout.

Other third-party cookies and technologies: We partner with a third-party ad network to manage our advertising on other websites. Our ad network partner uses cookies and other similar technologies to collect information about your activities on this Website and other websites to serve you with advertisements that may be of interest to you. If you wish to not have information related to you used for the purpose of serving you interest-based ads, you can use industry platforms to opt out of interest-based advertising. To learn more about interest-based advertising and how to exercise your choices, please visit http://optout.aboutads.info/ and https://optout.networkadvertising.org/?c=1. Because these are cookie-based opt outs, if you disable or delete cookies on your device after using these opt-out tools, you will need to complete the opt-out process again. Please note that opting out of interest-based advertising does not opt you out of receiving advertising online and that after opting out of interest-based advertising you will continue to receive ads that are not tailored to your interests.

DISCLOSURE OF PERSONAL INFORMATION

CCC shares the information that you provide to us in accordance with our obligations to copyright rightsholders to identify uses of their copyrighted materials. These obligations vary from CCC program to program. Details about such obligations under any particular CCC program are available upon request. CCC does NOT, however, share the following information with copyright rightsholders: (i) credit card details, or (ii) details about the use of OTHER copyright rightsholders’ copyrighted materials.

Additionally, when you use your organization’s credit card or CCC billing account to transact business with us, we will share with your organization information about the materials you have used and reported to CCC. Similarly, in circumstances where multiple individuals associated with the same organization share a single CCC account or a single username and password, each individual may have access to information provided by the other individuals on the same account.

Furthermore, in connection with one or more of the purposes outlined in the “Use of Personal Information” section above, we may disclose your personal information to the categories of third parties described below.

  • Our affiliates. We will share your personal information with our affiliates as necessary or appropriate.
  • Our service providers. We will share your personal information with providers of services, including providers of system/data hosting, management, and support services; data analysis services; shipping and printing services; credit card processing services; and other services related to the operation of our business. Our third-party service providers are to use the personal information they receive from us only as necessary to provide their services to us and are prohibited from retaining, sharing, storing, or using the personal information that they receive from us for any other purposes.
  • Relevant third parties as part of a corporate transaction. In the event of a reorganization, merger, sale, joint venture, assignment, transfer, or other disposition of all or any portion of our business, assets, or stock (including in connection with a bankruptcy or similar proceeding), we may disclose or transfer your personal information to certain third parties, such as the acquiring entity and its advisors. Where appropriate, we will endeavor to notify you via email and/or a prominent notice on this Website of any change in ownership as well as any choices you may have regarding your personal information.
  • Competent governmental and public authorities. In certain situations, we may be required to disclose your personal information in response to lawful requests by public authorities, including to meet national security or law enforcement requirements. We reserve the right to disclose your personal information as required by law, such as to comply with a subpoena or similar legal process and when we believe that disclosure is necessary to comply with a judicial proceeding or court order.
  • Other third parties. We may share your personal information with other third parties at your direction or with your consent. Additionally, we will share your personal information as necessary or appropriate to: (a) enforce our terms & conditions; (b) protect our operations; (c) protect our rights, privacy, safety, or property, and/or those of you or others; and (d) allow us to pursue available remedies or limit damages that we may sustain.

CROSS-BORDER TRANSFER OF PERSONAL INFORMATION

The disclosures described above may result in the transfer of your personal information to any country in which we do business and/or the information recipient is located, including the United States. Such transfers may result in your personal information being transferred to and/or stored in a country or region with data protection or privacy laws that differ from those in your country of residence.

In order to ensure that your personal information is adequately protected, we transfer your personal information subject to suitable safeguards being in place. For example, if you are based in the European Economic Area (“EEA”), Switzerland, or the United Kingdom (“UK”), we use contracts approved by the European Commission or the UK government that provide appropriate safeguards for personal information that is transferred to countries that have not been recognized by the European Commission or the UK government as providing an adequate level of protection for personal information.

By using this Website and providing us with your personal information, you are acknowledging that your personal information may be transferred outside of your country of residence. To find out more about how we safeguard your personal information when it is transferred across borders, please contact us using the details provided in the “Contact Us” section below.

THIRD-PARTY WEBSITES AND SERVICES

This Privacy Policy does not address, and we are not responsible for, the content or privacy practices of any third party, including those that operate websites to which this Website may link.

This Website may offer you the ability to interact with social plugins and other features from social media networks, such as Facebook and X (formerly, Twitter) “like” buttons or interactive mini-programs that run on this Website. These social media plugins and features may collect your IP address, locate the page you are visiting on this Website, and set a cookie to enable the social media plugin or feature to function properly. These social media plugins and features may be hosted by a third party or hosted directly on this Website. Nonetheless, as with linked websites, we have no control over the information that is collected, stored, or used by any social media network and your interactions with any plugin or feature offered by a social media network is governed by the privacy policy of the company providing it.

YOUR CHOICES AND RIGHTS

Depending on your country (or U.S. state) of residence, you may have a number of rights in relation to your personal information, including the right to:

  • request access to, or a copy of, your personal information, together with details about our handling of your personal information;
  • request that we update the personal information we hold about you or correct such information that is inaccurate or incomplete (note that you may also be able to update or correct your information on your own on this Website);
  • restrict the way in which we use your personal information (e.g., if we have no legal right to keep using it) or limit our use of your personal information (e.g., if your personal information is inaccurate or unlawfully held);
  • object to our use of your personal information;
  • withdraw the consent that you have given us to use your personal information (where we process your personal information on the basis of your consent);
  • request that we delete the personal information we hold about you (subject to certain exceptions prescribed by law);
  • receive the personal information you have provided in a structured, commonly used, and machine-readable format and request the transfer of such information to another entity, to the extent applicable; and
  • lodge a complaint with the appropriate authority in your place of residence regarding our handling of your personal information.

If you are interested in exercising one or more of the rights outlined above, you can write to us at: Copyright Clearance Center, Inc., Customer Relations Department, 222 Rosewood Drive, Danvers, Massachusetts 01923, USA; or email us at info@copyright.com.

When you contact us, please include your name, mailing address and/or email address, account number (if known), and a detailed explanation of your request. We will respond to your request promptly. In order to protect your privacy, we may require proof of your identity before we can act on your request. Where applicable, we will use the requested information for verification purposes only.

Opt out of marketing communications: You can opt out of receiving marketing-related communications and newsletters from CCC by following the “unsubscribe” instructions that come with each message from us. In addition, you may opt out of receiving such communications by writing to us at: Copyright Clearance Center, Inc., Marketing Department, 222 Rosewood Drive, Danvers, Massachusetts 01923, USA; emailing us at marketing@copyright.com; or calling us at 978-750-8400 and asking to speak with the Marketing Department. Please note that even if you opt out of receiving marketing communications from us, we may still send you administrative and transactional messages from which you cannot opt out.

SECURITY

The security of your personal information is important to us. The password that protects your personal information, as well as your credit card information, is encrypted during transmission using transport layer security (TLS) technology, which is widely used on the Internet for this purpose. We also store your information in encrypted form.

While we adhere to generally accepted industry standards designed to protect your personal information, both during transmission and once we receive it, no method of transmission over the Internet or method of electronic storage is 100% secure. Therefore, we cannot guarantee the security of any personal information transmitted to us.

If you have any questions or concerns about the security of your personal information, you can email us at info@copyright.com, or contact our privacy team at privacy@copyright.com.

DATA PRIVACY FRAMEWORK NOTICE 

CCC complies with the EU-U.S. Data Privacy Framework Principles (“EU-U.S. DPF”) and Swiss-U.S. Data Privacy Framework Principles (“Swiss-U.S. DPF”) as set forth by the U.S. Department of Commerce regarding the collection, use, and retention of personal information transferred from the European Union and Switzerland to the United States (collectively, the “Principles”). CCC has certified to the Department of Commerce that it adheres to the Principles and is subject to the investigatory and enforcement powers of the U.S. Federal Trade Commission. If there is any conflict between the terms in this Privacy Policy and the Principles, the Principles shall govern. To learn more about the Data Privacy Framework program, and to view our certification, please visit https://www.dataprivacyframework.gov/.

This Data Privacy Framework Notice applies to the categories of personal information described in the “Use of Personal Information” section to the extent that it is transferred from the European Union or Switzerland to the United States in reliance on either the EU-U.S. DPF or the Swiss-U.S. DPF.

We collect and use personal information about individuals in the European Union and Switzerland for the purposes described in the “Use of Personal Information” section of this Privacy Policy. Personal information covered by this Data Privacy Framework Notice is collected and used only as permitted by the Principles. Where necessary and appropriate, CCC obtains consent prior to using or disclosing personal information.

Consistent with the Principles, CCC may disclose personal information to the categories of third parties identified in the “Disclosures of Personal Information” section of this Privacy Policy. Generally, we will only disclose personal information to third parties if it is:

  • to a third party providing services to us;
  • made with an individual’s permission or consent;
  • necessary to meet our legal obligations, including responding to lawful requests by public authorities and meeting national security or law enforcement requirements; or
  • reasonably necessary for legal or regulatory compliance purposes or for the establishment of legal claims.

Additional details about our disclosures of personal information are included in the “Disclosures of Personal Information” section of this Privacy Policy. To the extent provided by the Principles, CCC remains responsible and liable under the Principles if a third party acting as an agent on behalf of CCC processes personal information in a manner inconsistent with the Principles, unless CCC proves that it is not responsible for the event giving rise to the damage.

As specified in the Principles, individuals whose personal information is covered by this Data Privacy Framework Notice have the right to access the personal information that CCC maintains about them. If you are interested in accessing your personal information; requesting that we update, correct, or delete your personal information; or exercising any of the other choices or rights listed in the “Your Choices and Rights” section of this Privacy Policy, including limiting the use and disclosure of your personal information, you can write to us at: Copyright Clearance Center, Inc., Customer Relations Department, 222 Rosewood Drive, Danvers, Massachusetts 01923, USA; or email us at info@copyright.com.

In compliance with the Principles, CCC commits to resolve complaints about our collection or use of your personal information. EU and Swiss individuals with inquiries or complaints regarding this Data Privacy Framework Notice should first contact CCC at: privacy@copyright.com. CCC have further committed to refer unresolved EU-U.S. DPF complaints to its alternative dispute resolution provider located in the United States. If you do not receive timely acknowledgment of your complaint from us, or if we have not addressed your complaint to your satisfaction, you may contact our U.S. based third-party dispute resolution provider, TRUSTe. Please visit https://feedback-form.truste.com/watchdog/request for more information or to file a complaint. The third-party dispute resolution services are provided at no cost to you. Should the third-party dispute resolution be unable to resolve any issues or disputes, you may invoke the option under the EU-U.S. DFP of binding arbitration. For more information, please visit https://www.dataprivacyframework.gov/s/article/G-Arbitration-Procedures-dpf.

CHILDREN’S PRIVACY

We understand the importance of protecting the privacy of children, especially in the online environment. This Website is not designed for or intentionally directed at children under the age of 18, and we do not knowingly collect personal information from children under the age of 18. If we become aware that we have received personal information from an individual under the age of 18, we will take reasonable steps to delete such information from our records.

INFORMATION RETENTION

We will retain your personal information only as long as necessary to fulfill the purposes outlined in this Privacy Policy, unless a longer retention period is required or allowed under law.

If you request to deactivate your account or that we delete your personal information, we will endeavor to fulfill your request, but some personal information may persist in backup copies for a certain period of time and may be retained as necessary to comply with our legal obligations, resolve disputes, and enforce our agreements.

CHANGES TO THIS PRIVACY POLICY

We may update or amend this Privacy Policy from time to time to reflect changes in our practices with respect to the collection, use, and/or disclosure of personal information or changes in applicable law. The “Last Modified” date at the bottom of this page indicates when this Privacy Policy was last updated.

When we make any material change to this Privacy Policy, we will inform you by email (sent to the email address specified in your account) or by posting a notice on the homepage of www.copyright.com prior to the change becoming effective. We will keep the notice on our homepage for 30 days, thereafter stating that this Privacy Policy has been updated, and we will change the “Last Modified” date on this page, noting when the policy was last updated.

We encourage you to review this Privacy Policy periodically to remain informed about our information handling practices.

CONTACT US

If you have any questions or concerns about this Privacy Policy or our information handling practices, please contact our data privacy team by sending an email to privacy@copyright.com or writing to:

Copyright Clearance Center

222 Rosewood Drive

Danvers, MA 01923 USA

Attn.: Privacy Officer

Last Modified: This page was updated on October 4, 2023.